Introduction

The purpose of this article is to enquire whether, in the face of
evidence gained from recent ape-language studies, it is still possible to
delineate clearly between human intellectual life and brute sentient life—to
refute the claims of the sensist philosophers who would reduce all human
knowledge and activities to the level of mere sensation and sense appetite.
This question cannot, and need not, be answered exhaustively in this
relatively short study of the matter. In order to respond in the
affirmative, it will suffice that we be able to show that even the most
sophisticated sensory activities of animals bear no legitimate threat to the
radical superiority of the human intellect—an intellect whose spiritual
character is rationally demonstrable.

Nor is it our intent to present here the formal proofs for the spiritual
nature of the human soul which have been offered by St. Thomas Aquinas and
others.1 Rather, our primary focus will be upon
an examination of evidence and arguments which reveal the inability of lower
animals to present a credible challenge to the uniqueness of human
intellectual life.

It has long been observed in nature that certain lower forms of life
often imitate the activities and perfections of higher forms. For example,
the tropisms found in certain plants—while not actually constituting
sensation—nonetheless deceptively simulate the sensitive reactions proper
to animals alone. So too, the human-like behavior of many “clever”
animals has caused much contemporary confusion on the part of, not only the
general populace, but also even presumed experts on animal behavior.

In great part this confusion has arisen because of the success of
Darwinian evolution and its attendant reductionism in dominating for much of
this century the academe of those natural sciences which deal with animal
and human behavior. Thus psychologists, zoologists, biologists,
anthropologists, etc., tend to view human behavior as nothing but an
extension in degree, not in kind, of lower animal behavior. Nowhere is this
tendency more acutely seen than in the controversies arising out of
contemporary ape-language studies.

For more than half a century various attempts have been made in a small
number of research projects to teach chimpanzees and other primates to talk.
The most successful techniques have involved the use of American Sign
Language and computer-based artificial language systems. Great publicity has
attended these efforts since the 1970s with claims of hundreds of words
being “understood” by these subjects, new complex words being invented,
and even sentences being formed with two-way “conversations” taking
place, not only between trainer and primate, but even between primate and
primate!

Dissent and Defense

Yet, by 1979, a simmering academic controversy about the legitimacy of
primate linguistic credentials burst into view of the general public with
the publication of two critical articles in Psychology Today2—one
by Columbia University psychologist H. S. Terrace, the other by University
of Indiana anthropologists Thomas and Jean Sebeok. Through a very careful
re-evaluation of the signing activities of the subject of his own research
project, a chimpanzee named Nim Chimpsky, Terrace concluded, “I could find
no evidence of an ape’s grammatical competence, either in my data or those
of others.”3

The Sebeoks, moreover, argued that animal researchers have been engaging
in a good deal of unwitting self-deception in accepting as linguistic
competence behavior which is actually the result of unconscious cuing. What
they refer to is what is widely called the Clever Hans effect—named after
a famous turn-of-the-century “thinking” horse whose “intelligent”
answers to questions were exposed by Berlin psychologist Oskar Pfungst as
simply the result of unintentional cues being given by his questioners.

The defenders of apes’ linguistic abilities engaged in immediate
counter-attack—producing an intellectual battle which rages to the present
day. It is important for us to note that almost all the participants in this
debate are natural scientists who are of one mind concerning man’s
materialistic and evolutionary origins. The input of dualist philosophers
and theologians has, thus far, been virtually nil. Thus the critics of the
“linguistic” apes, it should be observed, operate largely from a
perspective which views man as nothing but a highly developed animal and
which prescinds utterly from any philosophical arguments for the existence
and spiritual nature of the human soul.

Among the ape’s defenders, we find Suzanne Chevalier-Skolnikoff who
points out that the famed signing chimp, Washoe, has taught another chimp,
Loulis, how to sign—although she concedes, “Loulis learned his signs
mainly by imitation...”4

Chevalier-Skolnikoff also presents the following remarkable claims about
ape behavior:

Deception, “lying,” and joking are all behaviors that logically are
dependent upon mental combinations, or symbolization, and, like other
stage 6 behaviors, they cannot be cued. As mentioned above, deception,
lying, and joking all appear in stage 6 in nonsigning apes, and I have
observed this kind of behavior both nonlinguistically and in conjunction
with signing in the gorilla Koko during this stage. Consequently, I have
no reason to doubt, as some authors have, Patterson’s reports that Koko
tells lies and jokes.

Besides lying and joking, the gorilla Koko also has been recorded to
argue with and correct others. Arguing and correcting are dependent upon
comparing two viewpoints of a situation—existing conditions with
nonexisting ones—and therefore require mental representation.5

Intentional lying, deception, joking, arguing, and correcting—if actually
demonstrable from the research data—would, of course, bespeak
unequivocally the presence of intellective activity on the part of apes.
Yet, this is precisely why we must be so very careful about drawing such
inferences from the available evidence. We must always be cautious not to
assign facilely to higher causes that which could readily be explained in
terms of lower causes.

The Anthropomorphic Fallacy

While this is scarcely a proper context in which to explore and critique
the multiple data upon which Chevalier-Skolnikoff’s judgments are formed, it
must be noted that such judgments necessarily flow from an interpretation
of the concrete details examined. And herein lies the greatest danger to the
human researcher who attempts to “read” the animal subject. The Sebeoks
put the matter thus:

Investigators and experimenters, in turn, accommodate themselves to the
expectations of their animal subjects, unwittingly entering into a subtle
nonverbal communication with them while convincing themselves, on the
basis of their own human rules of interpretation, that the apes’ reactions
are more humanlike than direct evidence warrants.6

In a word, what the Sebeoks describe is the infamous anthropomorphic
fallacy, that is, the error of attributing human qualities to animals based
upon our nearly irresistible temptation to put ourselves in the brute’s
place, and then, to view his actions in terms of our own human intellectual
perspectives. The universality of this human tendency is such that even
experts in animal behavior frequently fail to avoid its pitfalls.

The specific content of such habitual anthropomorphism by ape researchers
is thus described by the Sebeoks:

Time and again researchers read anomalous chimpanzee and gorilla signs
as jokes, insults, metaphors, and the like. In one case, an animal was
reported to be deliberately joking when, in response to persistent
attempts to get it to sign “drink” (by tilting its hand at its mouth),
it made the sign perfectly, but at its ear rather than its mouth.7

Clearly, this sort of suspicion strikes at the heart of Koko’s claimed
performance of “deception, lying, joking, etc.”

In fact, the synergism of anthropomorphism and the Clever Hans effect is
seen by psychologist Stephen Walker as justifying inherent skepticism about
any and all claims made on behalf of American Sign Language trained apes.

The most important type of unwitting human direction of behavior which
has been interpreted as the product of the mental organisation of the apes
themselves is in the “prompting” of sequences of gestures in animals
trained with the American Sign Language method.... As practically all
instances of sequences or combinations of gestures by chimpanzees or
gorillas are made in the context of interactions with a human companion,
there is virtually no evidence of this kind which is not vulnerable to the
charge that the human contact determined the sequence of combinations
observed.8

Yet, not all ape communication techniques employed by researchers have
involved the use of American Sign Language. Plastic symbols,
computer-controlled keyboards, and other artificial devices have been
utilized in order to lessen, or possibly eliminate, human influence on the
process.

In defending the research of Savage-Rumbaugh—who used a
computer-controlled keyboard system—psychologist Duane M. Rumbaugh insists
that the evidence shows the clear capacity for categorization free from any
Clever Hans effect:

For our apes the symbols are referential, representational, and
communicative in value. Data obtained and reported by Savage-Rumbaugh at
that convention made it clear that the chimpanzees Sherman and Austin
categorize learned symbols as foods and tools (nonedibles) just as they
categorize the physical referents themselves. These data were obtained
from tightly controlled test situations in which the animals had no human
present in the room at the keyboard to influence their choice of keys for
purposes of categorizing.9

In this, though, as in all other instances of supposed lower primate “intentional”
communication, the fundamental problem which remains is the influence of man
in “programming” the training and responses of the animals, and then,
man’s tendency to anthropomorphize the interpretation of the results of this
very influence. The results never seem quite as definitive to the skeptics
as they do to the researchers who nearly live with the subjects they wish to
“objectively” investigate. The inherent difficulty posed for those who
would completely eliminate the Clever Hans effect is well-stated by the
Sebeoks.

Apes simply do not take part in such man-made laboratory tests without
a great deal of coaxing. The world’s leading authority on human-animal
communication, Heini Hediger, former director of the Zurich zoo, in fact
deems the task of eliminating the Clever Hans effect analogous to squaring
the circle—“if only for the reason that every experimental method is
necessarily a human method and must thus, per se, constitute a human
influence on the animal.”10

Thus we see that the Sebeoks support Hediger’s claim that total
elimination of the Clever Hans effect would constitute an actual
contradiction in terms—a goal entirely impossible of attainment.

Escaping from Clever Hans

And yet, it is important not to rest the entire case against “talking”
apes upon the Clever Hans effect as championed by the Sebeoks. Walker points
to research done by Roger Fouts, the Gardners (with the famous Washoe), and
Savage-Rumbaugh as appearing to escape the charge of unintentional cuing.
Concerning the latter, he writes:

When two chimpanzees exchanged information between themselves, using
the computer-controlled keyboard system, with experimenters not in the
same room (Savage-Rumbaugh et al., 1978b), the evidence seems
relatively robust.11

It would appear that the phrase, “Clever Hans effect,” is now being
given a meaning which includes two distinct aspects: (1) unintentional cuing
of the animals and (2) any human influence upon the animals. While
the Sebeoks and other critics are undoubtedly correct in insisting that
human influence is inherent in every ape experiment devised by man, yet it
is also clearly not the case that unintentional cuing can explain all
significant ape communicative achievements.

Given exhaustive, and sometimes exhausting, training by researchers,
several novel and rather impressive ape communication performances—free of
all unintentional cuing—have been reasonably well documented. What is
referred to here is not merely the well-known abilities of trained
chimpanzees and gorillas to associate arbitrary signs with objects, nor even
their ability to string together series of such signs in what Terrace and
others dismiss as simply urgent attempts to obtain some immediately sensible
reward.

Rather, more impressive experimental results are now forthcoming, e.g.,
the Savage-Rumbaugh experiments in which two chimpanzees were taught to
communicate and cooperate with each other—using a computer keyboard to
transmit information revealing the location of hidden food.12
In another experiment, after extensive training and prompting, the same
animals learned to cooperate with one another by handing over the correct
tool needed to obtain food when their primate partner requested it—again
by use of computer symbols and without human presence during the actual
experiment. Walker offers his inferences there from:

There can be little doubt, in the case of this experiment, that the
visual patterns used in the keyboard system had mental associations with
objects, and that the chimpanzee who punched a particular key did this in
the expectation that the other animal would hand him a particular tool.13

Still later, these same prodigious chimpanzees advanced to seemingly
quite abstract symbolic associations:

When they were trained with arbitrary symbols assigned to the two
object categories “foods” and “tools” Austin and Sherman
successfully selected the appropriate category, when shown arbitrary
symbols which were the names for particular foods or tools (Savage-Rumbaugh
et al., 1980). That is, they were able to label labels, rather than
merely label objects: for instance if shown the arbitrary pattern
indicating “banana” they responded by pressing the key meaning
“food,” but if shown the symbol for “wrench” they
pressed the “tool” key.14

Finally, Woodruff and Premack are reported to have devised a cuing-free
experiment in which chimpanzees indicated by gesture the presence of food in
a container to human participants who did not know its location. They would
correctly direct “friendly” humans who would then share the food with
them, but would mislead “unfriendly” humans who would not share
the food—since the animals were then permitted to get the food for
themselves.15

Each of the above experimental “successes” is of interest since each
appears to be quite free, not from original human influence in the training
process, but at least from the Clever Hans effect of unintentional cuing.
Moreover, they demonstrate fairly complex symbol-object associative skills,
“intentional” communication, and even, in the last case, some form of
“deception.” We place quotation marks about the terms, “intentional”
and “deception,” because the exact cognitive content of such acts
remains to be properly understood.

Yet, despite the above-described notable results of non-cued experiments
as well as claims of hundreds of “words” being learned and of “sentences”
and even “dialogue” being articulated by signing apes, careful natural
scientific observers remain convinced of essential differences still
remaining between ape and human capabilities.

The Uniqueness of Human Speech

After extremely careful analysis of all the relevant data and arguments
presented by the ape-language studies, Walker finally concludes that man’s
linguistic capabilities remain unique:

Apes trained to employ artificial systems of symbolic communication
ought not, therefore, to be said to have acquired a language, in the sense
that people acquire a language. Human language is unique to humans, and
although some of the distinctive features of human speech, such as the
mimicking of sounds, may be observed in other species, the resemblance
between, for instance, the trained gesturing of a chimpanzee and
communication via sign- language among the human deaf is in some senses no
greater than the resemblance between the speech of a parrot and that of
its owner.16

A parrot might, hypothetically, be trained to say, “Polly wants a
cracker because Polly is hungry and because Polly knows that a cracker would
neutralize the hyperacidity of his stomach acid and thereby reestablish its
normal pH.” It might even be trained to say this in order to obtain food
when hungry. Yet, no one would seriously contend that the bird in question
actually understands concepts such as “neutralize,” “hyperacidity,”
and “normal pH.” It is one thing to associate a trained response with a
given stimulus, but quite another to grasp intellectually the intrinsic
nature of each in all its various elements as well as the nature of the
cause-effect relationship entailed.

Walker also concludes that—aside from their evident superiority in
terms of the “sheer quantity” of associations learned—the apes’
capabilities do not qualitatively exceed those of lower species, e.g., as
when a dog responds to the arbitrary sign of a buzzer in order to obtain a
piece of meat through the performance of some trained action:

In so far as it can be demonstrated that the apes establish a
collection of associations between signs and objects, then the results of
their training extend further than any previously observed form of animal
learning, but it is not clear that they need a substantially different
kind of ability to make these associations from that which may be used by
other mammals to respond to smaller sets of signals.17

He also notes the essential dependence of the animals upon human
influence in order to assure their performance:

Even when a computer-controlled keyboard is used, so that tests can be
made in the absence of a human presence, social interactions between human
trainers and the animal being trained are apparently necessary if the
animal is to show any interest in using the keyboard (Rumbaugh, 1977).18

Finally, Walker eloquently describes the radical wall of separation which
distinguishes man from all the lower primates—pointing in particular to
man’s unique possession of language in its proper meaning:

Of all the discontinuities between man and animals that could be
quoted, including the exclusively human faculties for abstraction, reason,
morality, culture and technology, and the division of labour . . . the
evergreen candidate for the fundamental discontinuity, which might qualify
all others, is language. . . . In a state of nature we expect humans to
talk, and by comparison, the most unrelenting efforts to induce our
closest living relatives to reveal hidden linguistic potential have left
the discontinuity of speech bloodied, but unbowed.19

With respect to the linguistic facility of apes in comparison to man,
Walker maintains that chimpanzees form “mental” associations—but that
their abilities pale against those displayed by people:

It seems necessary to accept that under the conditions described,
chimpanzees form mental associations between perceptual schemata for
manual gestures and others for object categories. This is not to say, in
Romanes’s phrase, that they can mean propositions, in forms such as “all
chimpanzees like bananas....” [S]ince it has not been convincingly
demonstrated that one chimpanzee gesture modifies another, or that there
is any approximation to syntax and grammar in the comprehension or
expression of artificial gestures, the similarity between the use of
individual signs by apes, and the use of words by people, is definitely
limited.20

Despite Walker’s willingness here to defend the uniqueness of man, we
note that he yet shares the tendency of most natural scientists to describe
lower primates’ associative imaginative acts while employing philosophically
misapplied terms such as “mental,” “understand,” and “think.” In
proper philosophical usage, such terms are strictly predicable of human
intellectual activities. Their application to brute animals in this context
serves only to confuse the intellectual with the sentient order.

In an observation which strikes at the very heart of all ape language
experiments, Hediger supports the claim by biophilosopher Bernard Rensch who
noted in 1973 that nothing like human language has ever been found among any
of the apes in the state of nature. Hediger comments:

In other words, with all animals with which we try to enter into
conversation we do not deal with primary animals but with anthropogenous
animals, so-to-speak with artifacts, and we do not know how much of their
behavior may still be labeled as animal behavior and how much, through the
catalytic effect of man, has been manipulated into the animal. This is
just what we would like to know. Within this lie the alpha and omega of
practically all such animal experiments since Clever Hans.21

This amounts to a recognition that all ape-language studies presuppose
the invention of true language by man. This peculiarly human invention is
then imposed by man upon the apes. The day on which apes create their
own linguistic system is still the dream of science fiction.

As is well known to the philosophical science of psychology, human
language consists of a deliberately invented system of arbitrary or
conventional signs.22 Thus the English word “red”
could just as well have stood for the natural color green—except for the
convention or agreement by all that it should represent just what it does.
The alternative to such arbitrary signs consists of what are termed natural
signs, which, as the name implies, flow from the very nature of something.
Thus smoke is a natural sign of fire, a beaver slapping its tail on water is
a natural sign of danger, and the various calls of birds are signs of
specific natural meanings—which cannot be arbitrarily interchanged or
invented. The hiss of a cat is never equivalent to its purr.

From all this, it is clear that in teaching apes to “talk” man is
simply imposing upon them his own system of arbitrary or conventional signs.
The signs belong to man, not to the apes. The apes use them only
because we train them to do so. We thus turn the apes, as Hediger says, into
“artifacts” of our own creation.

Hediger emphasizes the importance of not underestimating the impact of
human training upon lower species:

This amazing act of training causes one to ponder the manifold efforts
of several researchers to enter into language contact, into a dialogue
with apes....

In each case the chimpanzees were demonstrated the desired actions with
the hope that they would react in a certain way. . . . with Washoe, Sarah,
Lana, and so forth, it is the production of certain signs in which we
would like to see a language. But how can we prove that such answers are
to be understood as elements of a language, and that they are not only
reactions to certain orders and expression, in other words simply
performances of training?23

One perhaps should ponder here that it is not brute animals alone which
can react to training in a way which bespeaks performance but lack of
understanding. Have we not all, at one time or another, heard a small child
speak a sentence—even with perfect syntax and grammar—whose meaning
obviously utterly eludes him? Or, at least, we hope it eludes him!
And, if such can occur in children through training and imitation, one can
well understand Hediger’s hesitancy to attribute intellectual understanding
to a brute animal when such acts could well be explained by simple
performance training.

Moreover, Hediger makes a suggestion which reveals the extreme difficulty
entailed in assuring that apes actually do understand the meanings of the
“words” they gesture under present methods:

I do not doubt that Washoe and other chimps have learned a number of
signs in the sense of ASL. But it seems to me that a better clarification
could be reached mainly through the introduction of the orders “repeat”
and “hold it.” By this the chimpanzee could show that he really
understands the single elements and does not execute fast, sweeping
movements into which one possibly could read such elements.24

Since such “stop action” techniques have never even been attempted in
present ASL trained apes, it would seem that demonstration of true
intellectual understanding of hand signs in them is virtually impossible. By
contrast, humans frequently do explicate their precise meanings to each
other—even to the point of writing scholarly papers immersed in linguistic
analysis.

The Inferiority of Apes

In contrast with the rather elevated dialogue about apes’ supposed “mental”
abilities, Hediger makes a fundamental observation designed to cut the
Gordian knot of much of the controversy. Analogous to the old retort, “If
you are so smart, why aren’t you rich?,” Hediger’s rather fatally apropos
version runs essentially thus: “If apes are so intelligent, why can’t they
learn to clean their own cages?”

If apes really dispose of the great intelligence and the highly
developed communication ability that one has attributed to them lately—why
in no case in the zoos of the world, where thousands of apes live and
reproduce, has it been possible to get one to clean his own cage and to
prepare his own food?25

In a follow-up comment made, presumably, without any personal prejudice
against apes, Hediger writes, “Apes have no notion of work. We might
perhaps teach an ape a sign for work but he will never grasp the human
conception of work.”26

Finally, Hediger notes that “the animal has no access to the future. It
lives entirely in the present time.”27 And
again, Hediger insists, “To my knowledge, up to now, no animal, not even
an ape, has ever been able to talk about a past or a future event.”28

If argument from authority has any force at all, it should be noted here
that Heini Hediger is described by the Sebeoks as the “world’s leading
authority on human-animal communication... (and) ...former director of the
Zurich zoo....”29

Moreover, the conclusions by Walker cited above warrant special attention
because his book, Animal Thought, represents an outstanding synthesis
of available data on animal “mental” processes and includes an extensive
review of the recently conducted ape-language studies.30

In addition to the specific distinctions between ape and man noted above,
the philosopher notices a pattern of evidence which tends to confirm his own
conclusions. For it is clear that the apes studied are, in all
well-documented activities, exclusively focused upon the immediate,
particular objects of their sense consciousness. They seek concrete sensible
rewards readily available in the present. Such documented observations are
entirely consistent with the purely sentient character of the
matter-dependent mode of existence specific to animals.

Apes have no proper concept of time in terms of knowing the past as past
or the future as future. Nor do they offer simply descriptive comment or
pose questions about the contents of the passing world—not even as a small
child does when he asks his father why he shaves or tells his mother she is
a good cook even though his stomach is now full.

Time and again it is evident that the most pressing obsession of any ape
is the immediate acquisition of a banana (or its equivalent). It has little
concern for the sorts of speculative inquiry about that same object which
would concern a botanist.

In fact, the whole experiential world of apes is so limited that
researchers are severely restricted in terms of their selection of
motivational tools capable of use in engaging them to perform or dialogue.
Hediger laments:

Therefore there remain the essential daily needs, above all metabolism,
food and drink, social and sexual contact, rest and activity, play and
comfort, conditions of environment in connection with the sensations of
pleasure and dislike, some objects, and possibly a few more things. This
is indeed rather modest.31

Small wonder the apes will neither philosophize nor clean their cages!

We have seen above that much of ape-communicative skills can be explained
in terms of simple imitation or unintentional cuing. Even in the carefully
controlled experiments designed to lessen or eliminate all cuing, the factor
of human influence in the extensive training needed to get apes to initiate
and continue their performance simply cannot be eliminated.

Yet, there seems to remain a legitimate need for further explanation of
the impressive ape-communicative skills manifested as the product of the
experiments done by Savage-Rumbaugh and others. Granted, exhaustive training
may explain why these chimpanzees and gorillas act in fashions never seen in
the state of nature. Yet, this does not fully avoid the need to explain the
remarkable character of the behavior produced by this admittedly artificial
state into which the animals have been thrust by human imposition.

In the first place, it must be noted that there is no undisputed evidence
of ape-language skills which exceed the domain of the association of
sensible images. Even the categorization of things like tools and actions
does not exceed the sensible abilities of lower species, e.g., the ability
of a bird to recognize selectively the objects which are suitable for nest
building. Nor does even the ability to “label labels” exceed, in
principle, the province of the association of internal images.

Intellective Activity

It should be observed here that the nature of intellectual knowledge does
not consist merely in the ability to recognize common sensible
characteristics or sensible phenomena which are associated with a given type
of object or action. Such sentient recognition is evident in all species of
animals whenever they respond in consistent fashion to like stimuli, as we
see in the case of the wolf sensing any and all sheep as the object of his
appetite.

On the contrary, the intellect penetrates beyond the sensible appearances
of things to their essential nature. Even at the level of its first act
(that is, simple apprehension or abstraction), the intellect “reads within”
the sensible qualities of an entity—thereby grasping intelligible aspects
which it raises to the level of the universal concept. Thus, while we can
imagine the sensible qualities of an individual triangle, we cannot
imagine the universal essence of triangularity—since a three-sided plane
figure can be expressed in infinitely varied shapes and sizes. Yet, the
concept of triangularity is a proper object of intellectual understanding.
Thus, the essence of conceiving the universal consists, not merely in an
association of similar sensible forms, but in the formation of a concept
abstracted from the individuating, singularizing influence of matter and
freed from all the sensible qualities which can exist only in an individual,
concrete object or action.

So too, the correct identification of, communication about, and
employment of an appropriate tool by a chimpanzee (in order to obtain food)
is no assurance of true intellectual understanding. Indeed, a spider which
weaves its web to catch insects is repeatedly creating the same type of tool
designed exquisitely to catch the same type of victim. Yet, does anyone
believe that this instinctive behavior bespeaks true intellectual
understanding of the means-end relation on the part of the spider? Hardly!
The evident lack of intelligence in the spider is manifest the moment it is
asked to perform any feat or task outside its fixed instinctive patterns.

Whether “programmed” by nature, as in the case of the spider, or by
man, as in the case of the chimpanzee, each animal is simply playing out its
proper role in accord with preprogrammed habits based upon recognition or
association of sensibly similar conditions. Certainly, no ape or any other
brute animal understands the means as means, the end as end, and the
relation of means to end as such. The sense is ordered to the particular;
only intellect understands the universal.

One may ask, “How do we know that the ape does not understand
the intrinsic nature of the objects or ”labels“ he has been trained to
manipulate?” The answer is that, just like the spider which cannot perform
outside its “programmed” instincts, so too, the ape—while appearing to
act quite “intelligently” within the ambit of its meticulous training,
yet exhibits neither the originality nor creative progress which man
manifests when he invents at will his own languages and builds great
civilizations and, yes, keeps his own “cages” clean!

Therefore, while it is clear that certain apes have been trained to
associate impressive numbers of signs with objects, it is also clear that
the mere association of images with signs and objects, or even of images
with other images, does not constitute evidence of intellectual
understanding of the intrinsic nature of anything. And it is precisely such
acts of understanding which remain the exclusive domain of the human
species.

Yet, the field of contest of ape-language studies is centered not only
upon the first act of the intellect discussed above, but also upon the
second and third acts of the intellect, i.e., upon judgment and reasoning.
Thus Chevalier-Skolnikoff insists that the chimpanzee, Washoe, and the
gorilla, Koko, exhibit true grammatical competence as, for example:

“breakfast eat some cookie eat,” signed by Koko at 5 years 6 months
and “please tickle more, come Roger tickle,” “you me go peekaboo,”
and “you me go out hurry,” signed by Washoe at about 3 years 9 months.
Besides providing new information, the structures of these phrases (like
those of the novel compound names) imply that they are intentionally
planned sequences.32

It is in the expression of such “intentionally planned sequences”
that Koko is reported to have argued with and corrected others, e.g., when
Koko pointed to squash on a plate and her teacher signed “potato.” Koko
is reported to have signed “Wrong, squash.”33

Even if one is disposed to accept the intrinsically anecdotal character
of all such data, we must remember the inherent danger of anthropomorphic
inferences warned against by Walker, the Sebeoks, and others. As Walker
concludes, because of the necessary interaction with a human companion
during such communication, “there is virtually no evidence of this kind
which is not vulnerable to the charge that the human contact determined the
sequence of combinations observed.”34

And while it is not evident precisely how the animal was trained to sign
“wrong” or otherwise indicate a negative, such a sign when associated
with a correct response (e.g., “squash”) need not reflect a genuinely
intellectual judgment. The correct response itself is simply proper
categorization which is the product of training. Its association with a
negative word-sign like “wrong” or “no” may simply be a sign which
is trained to be elicited whenever the interlocutor’s words or signs do not
fit the situation. The presumption of intellectual reflection and negative
judgments in such cases constitute rank anthropomorphism in the absence of
other specifically human characteristics, e.g., there appears to be no data
whatever recording a “correction” or “argument” entailing a
progressive process of reasoning. Rather, two signs, such as “No,
gorilla” or “Wrong, squash” constitute the entire “argument.”
Compare such simple “denials” to the lengthy syllogistic arguments—often
of many steps—offered in human debate. The apes, at best, appear to offer
us merely small collections of associated simple signs—usually united only
by the desire to attain an immediate sensible reward.

As noted earlier, apes have been reported to sign to other apes.35
They have even been reported to sign to themselves when alone.36
Such behavior, though striking, simply reflects the force of habit. Once the
proper associations of images to hand signs have been well established, the
tendency to respond in similar fashion in similar contexts—whether in the
presence of man or another ape or even in solitude—is hardly remarkable.

Critiquing the Research Data

Perhaps the most stinging defection from the ranks of those advocating an
ape’s grammatical competence is that of H. S. Terrace. His own research
project, whose subject was a chimpanzee named Nim Chimpsky, eventually led
him to question the legitimacy of initially favorable results. He then began
a complete re- evaluation of his own prior data as well as that which was
available from other such projects. Terrace now insists that careful
analysis of all ape-language studies fails to demonstrate that apes possess
grammatical competence.

Terrace suggests that in two studies using artificial language devices
what the chimpanzees “learned was to produce rote sequences of the type
ABCX, where A, B, and C are nonsense symbols and X is a meaningful element.”37
Thus, he argues, while the sign “apple” might have meaning for the
chimpanzee, Lana,

it is doubtful that, in producing the sequence please machine give
apple, Lana understood the meanings of please machine and give,
let alone the relationships between these symbols that would apply in
actual sentences.38

Terrace points to the importance of sign order in demonstrating simple
constructions, such as subject-verb-object, and then criticizes the Gardners
for failing to publish any data on sign order regarding Washoe.39

Perhaps the single most important contribution of Terrace has been his
effort “to collect and to analyse a large corpus of a chimpanzee’s sign
combinations for regularities of sign order.”40
Moreover, he initiated:

a painstaking analysis of videotapes of Nim’s and his teacher’s
signing. These tapes revealed much about the nature of Nim’s signing that
could not be seen with the naked eye. Indeed they were so rich in
information that it took as much as one hour to transcribe a single minute
of tape.41

These careful examinations of Nim’s signing activities lead Terrace to
conclude:

An ape signs mainly in response to his teachers’ urgings, in order to
obtain certain objects or activities. Combinations of signs are not used
creatively to generate particular meanings. Instead, they are used for
emphasis or in response to the teacher’s unwitting demands that the ape
produce as many contextually relevant signs as possible.42

Terrace points out the difficulty involved in attempting to evaluate the
performance of the other signing apes:

because discourse analyses of other signing apes have yet to be
published. Also, as mentioned earlier, published accounts of an ape’s
combinations of signs have centered around anecdotes and not around
exhaustive listings of all combinations.43

Seidenberg and Petitto raise similar objections to the anecdotal
foundation for some of the most significant claims made on behalf of apes:

A small number of anecdotes are repeatedly cited in discussions of the
apes’ linguistic skills. However, they support numerous interpretations,
only the very strongest of which is the one the ape researchers prefer,
i.e., that the ape was signing “creatively.” These anecdotes are so
vague that they cannot carry the weight of evidence which they have been
assigned. Nonetheless, two important claims—that the apes could combine
signs creatively into novel sequences, and that their utterances showed
evidence of syntactic structure—are based exclusively upon anecdote.44

Terrace also states that he has carefully examined films and videotape
transcripts of other apes, specifically Washoe and Koko. Regarding the
former, he concludes, “In short, discourse analysis makes Washoe’s
linguistic achievement less remarkable than it might seem at first.”45
Terrace also examined four transcripts providing data on two other signing
chimpanzees, Ally and Booee. Finally, he summarizes his findings:

Nim’s, Washoe’s, Ally’s, Booee’s, and Koko’s use of signs suggests a
type of interaction between an ape and its trainer that has little to do
with human language. In each instance the sole function of the ape’s
signing appears to be to request various rewards that can be obtained only
by signing. Little, if any, evidence is available that an ape signs in
order to exchange information with its trainer, as opposed to simply
demanding some object or activity.46

Following on similar criticisms by Terrace, Seidenberg and Petitto point
out the simple absence of data supporting the claims that apes show
linguistic competence:

The primary data in a study of ape language must include a large corpus
of utterances, a substantial number of which are analyzed in terms of the
contexts in which they occurred. No corpus exists of the utterances of any
ape for whom linguistic abilities are claimed.47

Terrace’s Nim Chimpsky, of course, is one chimpanzee for whom linguistic
ability was not claimed by his researcher. It is therefore
significant that the data collected on the Nim project is, by far, the most
exhaustive:

The data of Terrace et al. on Nim are more robust than those
offered by other ape researchers. Although their data are limited in
several respects, they are the only systematic data on any signing ape.48

If the above citation is factually correct, it means that the ape-
language studies fall into two categories: (1) the Nim project, which is
based upon “systematic data,” but whose researcher could find “no
evidence of an ape’s grammatical competence” and (2) the rest of the
projects, for whose subjects various claims of linguistic competence have
been made, but none of which are based upon “systematic data.”

Another weakness in the data—one which afflicts even the Nim project—is
the practice of simply deleting signs which are immediately repeated:

In comparing Nim’s multisign utterances and mean length of utterances (MLU)
to those of children, it is important to realize that all contiguous
repetitions were deleted. In this respect, Terrace et al. follow
the practice established by the other ape researchers. The repetitions in
ape signing constitute one of the primary differences between their
behavior and the language of deaf and hearing children, yet they have
always been eliminated from analyses.49

Needless to observe, the deletion of such uselessly repeated “words”
would tend to make an ape’s recorded “speech” appear much more
intelligible and meaningful than it actually is.

In a noteworthy understatement, Seidenberg and Petitto conclude, “There
are numerous methodological problems with this research.”50

Even if all available data from ape-language studies—anecdotal and
otherwise—were to be accepted at face value the legitimacy of claims about
apes understanding the meanings of their signs, creating new word complexes,
deceiving, lying, reasoning, etc., need not be recognized in the sense of
providing proof of the possession of genuine intellectual powers on their
part.

For it must be remembered that contemporary electronic computers can be
programmed to simulate many of these behaviors—and, probably, in
principle, all of them. Walker points out some of these capabilities:

Already there are computers which can recognise simple spoken
instructions, and there are computer programs which can play the part of a
psychotherapist in interchanges with real patients (Holden, 1977), so the
inability of machines to conduct low-grade conversations is no longer such
a strong point.51

If a computer can hold its own with real patients while feigning the role
of a psychotherapist, it should surely be able to perform many of the
functions of signing apes. Clearly, given appropriate sensing devices and
robotics, even the most impressive, non-cued Savage-Rumbaugh experimental
results could easily be simulated by computers—even by pairs of computers
exhibiting the co-operative exchange of information and objects as was seen
in the activities of the chimpanzees, Sherman and Austin.52
This would include the ability to “label labels,” e.g., to respond to
the arbitrary pattern for banana by pressing the key meaning food.53
Such performance may seem remarkable in an ape, but it would be literal
child’s play to a properly programmed computer.

Again, programming a computer to “deceive” or “lie to” an
interrogator is no great feat—although Woodruff and Premack apparently
spent considerable time and effort creating an environment which, in effect,
“programmed” chimpanzees to engage in just such unworthy conduct!54

Certainly there are, as yet, no reports about apes having learned to play
chess. Yet, Walker reports:

Pocket-sized computers are now available that can play chess at a
typical, if not outstanding, human level, accompanied by a rudimentary
attempt at conversation about the game. . . . In the face of modern
electronic technology, though, it is less obvious that it is impossible
for physical devices to achieve human flexibility than it was in the
seventeenth century.55

Evidently then, the electronic computer is capable of engaging in “low-grade
conversations”—and this, probably in a manner which would well outstrip
its nearest ape competitors.

While it must be conceded that all of the abovementioned capabilities of
electronic computers presuppose the agency of very intelligent human
computer programmers, yet the correlative “programming” of apes must be
understood to occur as a result of deliberate human training, unintentional
cuing, and unavoidable human influence upon the animals.

On the other hand, it must be recognized that the capabilities of apes
equal or exceed those of computers in several significant respects. In the
first place, the number of neurons in an ape’s brain has been put at about 5
X 109.56 This certainly constitutes
an impressive amount of almost instantaneously available “core storage.”
Moreover, while it is possible to attach elaborate “sensing” devices to
provide input data to a computer, nothing devised by man can match the
natural abilities of the multiple external and internal senses found in
higher animals, including the apes. Hence, their ability to sense and
categorize a banana as food is simply part of their natural “equipment.”
Finally, while extensive and complex robotic devices are now becoming an
essential ingredient in various computer-controlled manufacturing processes,
an ape’s limbs, hands, and feet afford him a comprehensive dexterity
unmatched by that of any single machine.

The point of all this is simply that none of the performances exhibited
by language-trained apes exceeds in principle the capacities of electronic
computers. And yet, electronic computers simply manipulate data. They
experience neither intellectual nor even sentient knowledge and, in fact, do
not even possess that unity of existence which is proper to a single
substance. A computer is merely a pile of cleverly constructed electronic
parts conjoined to form an accidental, functional unity which serves man’s
purpose.

It is in no way surprising, then, that man should be able to “program”
apes to perform in the manner reported by researchers. For these apes have,
indeed, become, as Heini Hediger so adroitly points out, artifacts—through
the language and tasks which we humans have imposed upon them.57

The force of much of the above argument from analogy will be lost upon
those who do not understand why we state that computers possess
neither substantial existence and unity nor any sentient or intellectual
knowledge. Our claims may seem especially gratuitous in an age in which
various computer experts proclaim the imminent possibility of success in the
search for artificial intelligence through the science of cybernetics.

Yet, it would appear to be sheer absurdity to suggest that the elementary
components of complicated contemporary computers—whether considered singly
or in concert—could conceivably experience anything whatsoever. For no
non-living substance—whether it be an atom, a molecule, a rock, or even an
electronic chip—is itself capable of sensation or intellection.

On the other hand, what answer can be given to the skeptic’s seemingly
absurd, but elusively difficult, query: “How can we be so certain that
some form of consciousness, or at least the potency for
consciousness, is not present in the apparently inanimate parts used
to compose a modern computer? As any novice logician is well aware, the
problems inherent in the demonstration of any negative are substantive.
Hence, the challenge of proving that inanimate objects are truly non-living,
non-sensing, non-thinking, etc., is difficult—the moment, of course, that
one is prepared to take the issue at all seriously.

Clearly, potentialities for sensation and intellection as well as other
life activities do exist—but only as faculties (operative potencies) of
already living things. These powers are secondary qualities inherent in and
proper to the various living species—which properties flow from their very
essence and are put into act by the apprehension of the appropriate formal
object. Thus, the potency for sight in an animal is a sensitive faculty of
its substantial form (soul) which enables the animal to see actually when it
is put into act by the presence of its proper sense object (color). This is
not the same at all as suggesting that inanimate objects as such might
possess such potencies or faculties.

Despite its apparent difficulty, though, it is indeed possible to
demonstrate that the universal absence of specific life activities—both in
the individual and in all other things of the same essential type—shows
that those life qualities are utterly outside of or missing from such a
nature. Or, to put the matter affirmatively, the presence of a given form
necessarily implies its formal effects, i.e., if a thing is alive, it must
manifest its life activities; if sensation is a power of its nature, it
must, at least at times, actually sense. That a power should exist in a
given species, but never be found in act, is absolutely impossible. This
fundamental truth can be shown as follows.

According to the utter certitude which is offered by the science of
metaphysics, there must exist a sufficient reason why a given thing
consistently exhibits certain qualities or activities, but not others. For
instance, if a non-living thing, such as a rock, manifests the qualities of
extension and mass, yet never exhibits any life activities, e.g., nutrition,
growth, or reproduction, then either such life powers must be absent from
its nature altogether, or else, if present, there must be some sufficient
reason why such powers are never exhibited in act. And that reason must be
either intrinsic or extrinsic to its nature. If it is extrinsic, then it
would have to be accidental to the nature, and thus, caused. As St. Thomas
Aquinas observes:

Everything that is in something per accidens, since it is
extraneous to its nature, must be found in it by reason of some exterior
cause.58

Moreover, what does not flow from the very essence of a thing
cannot be found to occur universally in that thing—even if it be the
universal absence of a quality or activity. For, as St. Thomas Aquinas also
points out:

The power of every agent [which acts] through necessity of nature is
determined to one effect, and therefore it is that every natural [agent]
comes always in the same way, unless there should be an impediment.59

Hence, while an extrinsic cause might occasionally interfere with the
vital activities of a living thing, such suppression of the nature’s
activities is relatively rare—and surely, never universal. Thus,
the ability to reproduce may be suppressed by an extrinsic cause in a few
individuals in a species, but most will reproduce. On the other hand, if
reproduction were absent in every member of a species, e.g., rocks, then the
absence of such activity must be attributed directly to the essence itself.

But if a thing is said to possess a power or potency to a certain act by
its very essence, and yet, that selfsame essence is said to be responsible
for its never actually exercising such a power, then such an essence becomes
self-contradictory—since that essence would then be responsible both for
its substance essentially being able to possess that quality and for it
never being able actually to possess that same quality. The same essence
would then be the reason why a thing is able to be alive or conscious and
also, at the same time, the reason why that same thing is never able
to be alive or conscious. This is clearly both absurd and impossible.

Moreover, Aristotle defines nature as “a source or cause of being
moved and of being at rest in that to which it belongs primarily....”60
But a nature which would also be the reason for a thing not moving or
resting would clearly contradict itself.

From all this it follows that if a quality or activity is lacking in each
and every member of a species of things, it is absent neither by accident
nor as a positive effect of the essence—but simply because such quality or
activity does not belong to its essence at all. Hence, non-living things
have no life powers within their natures. They can gain life powers only by
undergoing a substantial change, that is, by somehow becoming assimilated
into the very substance of a living thing, as when a tree absorbs nutrients
from the soil and then turns them into its very self.

But such is clearly not what happens when inanimate parts are
artificially joined together into an accidental, functional unity such as an
electronic computer. Thus, none of a computer’s individual parts which are
inanimate in themselves can exhibit the properties of life, sensation, or
intellection. Nor can any combination of such non-living entities—even if
formed into a highly complex functional unity—achieve the activities of
perception or thought, since these noetic perfections transcend utterly the
individual natures, and thus, the natural limitations, of its components.

Since it is an artificial composite of many substances, a computer
constitutes merely an accidental unity. As such, no accidental perfection
can exist in it which is not grounded in the natures of its constituent
elements. It is a perennial temptation to engage in the metaphysical slight
of hand of suggesting that somehow the whole might be greater than the sum
of its parts, that the total collectivity can exhibit qualities of existence
found in none of its elements. In this strange way, like Pinocchio, the
computer is averred to take on suddenly all the properties of a living
substance—to sense and to think.

But such is the stuff of fantasy. It is to commit the fallacy of
composition—to attribute to the whole qualities found in none of its
parts. It is like suggesting that an infinite multitude of idiots could
somehow—if only properly arranged—constitute a single genius. The
fundamental obstacle to all such speculation is the principle of sufficient
reason. For the non-living, as such, offers no existential foundation for
the properties of life. And merely accidental rearrangements of essentially
non-living components provide no sufficient reason for the positing of the
essentially higher activities found in living things—unless there takes
place the sort of substantial change described above. And such substantial
changes are found solely in the presently constituted natural order of
things, i.e., by assimilation or generation.

Since the hylemorphist philosopher understands that the substantial unity
of things above the atomic level depends upon some unifying principle, i.e.,
the substantial form, he knows that only natural unities possessing
appropriate cognitive faculties of sensation or intellection can actually
know anything. Thus a “sensing device” such as a television set running
in an empty room actually senses nothing. It cannot see its own
picture or hear its own sound. No genuine perception can occur until, say, a
dog stumbles into the room and glances at the set in operation. The dog can
see and hear the set precisely because the dog is a natural living
substantial unity whose primary matter is specified and unified by a
substantial form (its soul) which possesses the sense faculties of sight and
hearing. Absent the sensitive soul, the most complex “sensing device”
knows nothing of the sense data it records. Absent the intellectual soul, a
“thinking” machine understands nothing of the intelligible data it
manipulates nor even is it aware of its own existence. A computer could well
be programmed to pronounce, “Cogito ergo sum,” and yet remain completely
unaware of its own existence or anything else.

Godel’s Theorem

The inherent limitations of any electronic computer were unintentionally
underlined by the German mathematician Kurt Godel in 1930 when he proposed
his famed incompleteness theorem to the Vienna Academy of Sciences.
Expressed in disarmingly simply terms, the theorem states “that even in
the elementary parts of arithmetic there are propositions which cannot be
proved or disproved in that system.”61 Godel
himself initially vastly underestimated the profound implications of his
theorem. Among these were (1) that it struck “a fatal blow to Hilbert’s
great program to formalize the whole of mathematics...”62
and (2) that it “cuts the ground under the efforts that view machines...
as adequate models of the mind.”63

The distinguished theologian and physicist Stanley L. Jaki spells out the
impact of the incompleteness theorem on the question of computer
consciousness:

Actually, when a machine is requested to prove that “a specific
formula is unprovable in a particular system,” one expects the machine
to be self-conscious, or in other words, that it knows that it knows it,
and that it knows that it knows it that it knows it, and so forth ad
infinitum.... A machine would always need an extra part to reflect on its
own performance, and therein lies the Achilles heel of the reasoning
according to which a machine with a sufficiently high degree of complexity
will become conscious. Regardless of how one defines consciousness, such a
machine, as long as it is a machine in the accepted sense of the word,
will not and cannot be fully self-conscious. It will not be able to
reflect on its last sector of consciousness.64

Despite the logical adroitness of this analysis, we must, of course,
remember that in truth and in fact machines possess no psychic faculties at
all. They actually have neither even the most immediate level of reflection
nor any form of consciousness whatever.

What Godel’s theorem simply implies is that men are not machines—that
computers (because they have not a spiritual intellect) are unable to know
the truth of their own “judgments” since they lack the capacity for
self-reflective consciousness.

This analysis of computer deficiency based upon the incompleteness
theorem is offered simply to demonstrate that, although computers may be
able to simulate the abilities of language-trained apes, their computations,
nonetheless, remain essentially inferior to human cognitive abilities. In
truth, neither apes nor computers are capable of genuinely self-reflective
acts of intellection since such acts are possible for creatures with
spiritual intellects alone, e.g., man.65

Nonetheless, the fact that electronic computers—having neither
sensation nor intellection nor even life itself—could, in principle, be
designed and programmed so as to imitate, or even exceed, the skills of
language-trained apes is sufficient evidence that ape-language studies pose
no threat to man’s uniqueness as a species. Nor do the studies cast in any
doubt man’s uniquely spiritual nature—as distinguished from the rest of
the animal kingdom.

One striking bit of information drawn from the history of ape- language
studies has been saved until this point in our study in order to underscore
the radical difference between man and lesser primates. It demonstrates, as
Paul Bouissac points out, that the animal’s perspective on what is going on
may differ radically from our own. Now no language-trained ape possesses a
greater reputation for linguistic expertise and presumed civility than the
female chimpanzee, Washoe. It is therefore rather appalling to learn of the
following incident reported by Bouissac:

There are indeed indications that accidents are not infrequent,
although they have never been publicized; the recent attack of the
celebrated “Washoe” on Karl Pribram, in which the eminent psychologist
lost a finger (personal communication, June 13, 1980) was undoubtedly
triggered by a situation that was not perceived in the same manner by the
chimpanzee and her human keepers and mentors.66

In pointing to the divergence of perspective between man and ape,
Bouissac may well understate the problem. Washoe would have been about 15
years old at the time of the attack. Needless to say, humans of that age
have virtually never been recorded as even attempting to bite their
teachers—and this would seem especially true of outstanding students!

This clear-cut evidence that animals—even apes—simply do not perceive
the communicative context in the same way that man does demonstrates the
degree to which the anthropomorphic fallacy has overtaken many researchers—despite
their claims of caution in this regard.

A Positive Demonstration

While much of the preceding discussion pertinent to man’s uniqueness as a
species has focused upon signs of his spiritual nature and, to an even
greater degree, upon the failure of lower animals to demonstrate any
intellectual ability, philosopher and theologian Austin M. Woodbury, S.M.,
approaches the question with a fresh and more decisive perspective.67
He points out that the effort to explain all animal behavior in terms of
sensation alone could never be completed and might produce no more than a
probable conclusion because of the complexity of the task. One need only
consider the endless anecdotal data to be examined.68
To avoid the logical weakness of this negative approach, Woodbury proposes
an appropriate remedy by seeking direct and positive proof that brutes are
lacking in the necessary effects or signs of intelligence.69

For, he argues, the necessary effects of intellect are four: speech,
progress, knowledge of relations, and knowledge of immaterial objects. Since
each of these is a necessary effect, “if it be shown that even one
of these signs of intellect is lacking to ‘brutes’, then it is positively
proved that ‘brutes’ are devoid of intellect.”70
In fact, Woodbury argues that brute animals are in default in all four
areas.

While the most significant ape-language experiments were conducted after
Woodbury wrote his Psychology, nonetheless his insistence on the
absence of true speech among brute animals remains correct as we have seen
above. He points out that animals possess the organs of voice (or, we might
note, the hands to make signs), the appropriate sensible images, and the
inclination to manifest their psychic states—but they do not manifest true
speech since they lack intellect.71

What Woodbury seems to be saying is that, if brute animals actually
possessed intellect, they would have long ago developed their own forms of
communication expressed in arbitrary or conventional signs. Their failure to
do so is manifest evidence of the absence of intellect. On the contrary,
since all men do possess intellect, all men develop speech.72
While he does not, of course, make reference here to the signing apes, it is
clear that their behavior is to be explained by imitation and the
association of images. While man may impose signing upon such animals
artificially, their failure to have developed language on their own and in
their natural habitat demonstrates lack of true speech. That animals possess
natural signs is conceded, but irrelevant.

Neither do animals present evidence of genuine progress. Woodbury points
out that “from intellect by natural necessity follows progress in works,
knowledges and sciences, arts and virture.”73
While he grants that animals do learn from experience, imitation, and
training, yet, because they lack the capacity for intellectual
self-reflection, they are unable to correct themselves—an ability
absolutely essential to true progress.

Even in the most “primitive” societies, true men make progress as
individuals. For children learn language, arts, complex tribal organization,
complex legal systems, and religious rites.74
Woodbury notes, “Moreover, the lowest of such peoples can be raised by
education to very high culture.”75

Woodbury points out that the appetite to make deliberate progress is
inherent in a being endowed with intellect and will. For as the intellect
naturally seeks the universal truth and the will seeks the infinite good, no
finite truth or good offers complete satisfaction. Thus man, both as a
species and as an individual, seeks continually to correct and perfect
himself. While apes are ever content to satisfy the same sensitive urges,
men erect the ever-advancing technology and culture which mark the progress
of civilization. The failure of animals to make anything but accidental
improvements—except when the intellect of man imposes itself upon them
through training—proves the utter absence of intellect within their
natures.

Commenting on his third sign that intellect is lacking in animals,
Woodbury observes that brute animals lack a formal knowledge of relations.
They fail to understand the means-end relationship in its formal
significance. And, while men grasp the formal character of the cause-effect
relationship in terms of being itself, animals are limited merely to
perceiving and associating a succession of events.76

Woodbury distinguishes between possessing a universal understanding of
the ontological nature of means in relation to ends as opposed to possessing
a merely sensitive knowledge of related singular things. Lower animals
reveal their lack of such understanding whenever conditions change so as to
make the ordinarily attained end of their instinctive activity unobtainable.
For they then show a lack of versatility in devising a substitute means to
that end. Also, they will continue to repeat the now utterly futile action
which instinct presses upon them. Woodbury offers this example:

Thus apes, accustomed to perch themselves on a box to reach fruit, if
the box be absent, place on the ground beneath the fruit a sheet of paper
and perch themselves thereupon.77

This same example reveals how lower animals “show no knowledge of
distinction between causality and succession....”78
Clearly, had they any understanding of causality, the apes would not
conceive a “sheet of paper” as causally capable of lifting them
significantly toward the fruit.

The fourth and final sign that intellect is clearly lacking in animals
pertains to knowledge of immaterial things. Woodbury points out that our
intellectual nature impels us to a knowledge of science, the exercise of
free choice, the living of a moral life, the exercise of religion, etc.79
Such abstract and evidently supra-temporal objects are so clearly absent in
the life of apes and other animals as to need no further comment.

Thus we see that brute animals, including apes, are clearly lacking in
all four of the necessary formal effects of intellect, that is, speech,
progress, knowledge of relations, and knowledge of immaterial objects. From
this it follows with apodictic certitude that lower animals must lack the
intellective faculties.

Image and Concept

Perhaps the most important distinction to be kept in mind when attempting
to understand animal behavior is that offered by Woodbury when he discusses
the intellectual knowing of universal concepts as opposed to the knowledge
had through a common image or common scheme—since it is very tempting to
identify the two, as materialists are so prone to do. He presents this
definition of the common image:

But a COMMON IMAGE or COMMON SCHEME is vastly diverse from a universal
concept: for it is nothing else than AN IMAGE OF SOME SINGULAR
THING ACCORDING TO ITS SENSIBLE APPEARANCES WHICH HAPPENS TO BE LIKE OTHER
SINGULAR THINGS, SINCE THEY ARE LIKE THAT WHEREOF IT IS THE IMAGE.80

Since the entire sensitive life of apes and lower animals (including the
phenomena associated with signing behavior) is rooted in the association of
images, and since common images are so frequently confused with universal
concepts, one can readily understand the errors of so many modern animal
researchers. They suffer the same confusion as the 18th century
sensist philosopher, David Hume, who conceived images as sharply focused
mental impressions and ideas as simply pale and derivative images.81
Neither he nor the modern positivistic animal researchers understand the
essential distinction between the image and the concept.

And yet, it is precisely in this distinction that the radical difference
between the material and spiritual orders becomes manifest. For, being
rooted in the individuating, quantifying character of matter, the image is
always of the singular. It is always particular, sensible, concrete and, in
a word, imaginable—as one can easily imagine a single horse or even a
group of horses. On the contrary, the concept—because it involves no
intrinsic dependence upon matter at all—is universal in nature. It entails
no sensible qualities whatever, can have varying degrees of extension when
predicated, and is entirely unimaginable. No one can imagine
horseness. No single image of a horse or group of horses would fit equally
all horses—even though the common image of “a horse” would enable a
fox to recognize sentiently the sensible similarities of all horses. In
fact, this “common image” is more useful for the instinctive life of
animals—for it suffices the cat to know the common image of a mouse in
order that its estimative sense may sensibly recognize it as an object to be
pounced upon and eaten. The intellectual understanding of the internal
essence of a mouse may well be suited to the interest of the professional
biologist—but it is hardly necessary or even very helpful to the famished
feline predator.82

In order to see more fully the significance of the distinction between
mere recognition of a common image and true intellectual apprehension of an
intelligible essence, let us consider the following example: Imagine a dog,
an uneducated aborigine, and a civilized man—all observing a train pulling
into a station at the same time over successive days. All three would
possess a common image of the train which would permit sensible recognition
of the likeness of the singular things involved, i.e., the sequentially
observed trains. (Whether it is, in fact, the exact same engine, cars, and
caboose is irrelevant—since similar sets of singular things could be known
through a common image.)

Yet, the sensible similarities are all that the dog would
perceive. In addition, the civilized man would understand the essence of the
train. He would grasp the intelligibility of the inner workings of the
causal forces of fire on water producing steam whose expansion drives
pistons to move wheels which pull the whole vehicle, cargo and passengers as
well, forward in space through the passage of time.

Well enough. But what of the uneducated aborigine? What differentiates
him from the dog is that, even though he may not initially know the
intrinsic nature of the train, his intellect is at once searching for an
answer to the why of the entire prodigy. He may make what, to us,
would be amazing errors in this regard—as did the natives of Borneo who
are reported to have attempted to give animal feed to cargo planes which
landed there during World War II. But search the causes in being of the
inner structure of the train, he certainly would! And, most importantly,
with but a little explanation the aborigine would quickly come to the same
basic understanding of the train as the rest of us—while the dog still
would bark uselessly at its noise.

So too, when man and mouse perceive the same mousetrap what is perceived
is quite different. The mouse sees the cheese; we see a potentially
death-dealing trap. Small wonder, then, the divergence of perspective
between psychologist Pribram and chimpanzee Washoe concerning the proper
role of Pribram’s finger in the context of their “communication”! For at
every level of communication it must be remembered that the perception of
animals is purely sensory while that of man is both sensory and
intellectual. Thus the mouse sees the cheese in a strictly sensory manner
and as the object of its purely sensitive appetite. On the other hand, a man
sees both sensitively and in the analogous meaning of intellectual “sight.”
Thus the deadliness of the trap is evident to man alone. The mouse—from
a past close call—may react in fear before the trap because it associates
an image of the trap with an image of earlier (non-fatal) pain. Yet, only
man knows why the mouse should be afraid.

By now it should be quite clear that the available animal studies are
entirely consistent with the above explanation. Moreover, this explanation
is the only one which fits the facts—since animals, as Woodbury has shown,
reveal that they lack the intellectual faculties which we possess.

Conclusion

In the course of our examination of the question under investigation we
have distinguished man from lower animals in two ways: First, we have
demonstrated that the presently available natural scientific evidence
regarding lower animal behavior, including the recent ape-language studies,
constitutes no legitimate challenge to the essential superiority of the
human intellect. Second, we have presented briefly Woodbury’s positive
demonstrations for the non-existence of intellect in lower animals. We have
also noted many of the unique capabilities and accomplishments of man—both
individually and collectively considered—which bespeak his possession of
intellectual faculties which utterly transcend the world of brutes.

Additional Resource

Origin
of the Human Species by Dennis Bonnette. Dr. Bonnette offers a
philosophical analysis of the theory of evolution with particular
application to human origins and the literal historical meaning of Genesis.
The second edition includes a new foreword written by Dr. Michael J. Behe,
author of Darwin’s
Black Box. This book defends the compatibility of sound science with
legitimate scriptural interpretation, but without depending on young-Earth
creationism. The book shows that no matter what major approach to life’s
origins is taken, the historicity of Adam and Eve can still be defended. For
more information, see Dr. Bonnette’s web site at drbonnette.com.

Hediger in The Clever Hans Phenomenon, p. 14.
In his History of Animals, VIII, 1, (589a3-589a9), Aristotle
makes much the same point: “The life of animals, then, may be divided
into two acts—procreation and feeding; for on these two acts all their
interests and life concentrate. Their food depends chiefly on the
substance of which they are severally constituted; for the source of
their growth in all cases will be this substance. And whatsoever is in
conformity with nature is pleasant, and all animals pursue pleasure in
keeping with their nature.”

According to the eminent physicist-theologian Stanley
L. Jaki, the number of potential memory units in the brain is
phenomenal. See his Brain, Mind and Computers (New York: Herder
and Herder, 1969). He writes, “After all, the latitude between 1027,
the estimated number of molecules in the brain, and 1010, the
estimated number of neurons, is enormous enough to accommodate any
guess, however bold, fanciful, or arbitrary.” (page 110) Since on page
115, he tells us that “the human brain... [has] ...twice as many
neurons as the number of neurons in the brain of apes,” we conclude
that the number of neurons in the brain of apes must be 5 X 109.

It is noteworthy that even a chimpanzee brought up in
a human family learns no speech at all whereas a human child does so
easily and quickly. While it is conceded that chimpanzees and other apes
lack the vocal dexterity of man, yet it must be noted that they do
possess sufficient vocal equipment to enable them to make limited
attempts at speech—just as would any human suffering from a severe
speech defect. Yet, apes attempt nothing of the sort.